Yeah, I have a schwab account, it's one of the few places left that do all of that. We use the account for gift purchases, so there's not usually that much money in it outside of Christmas time, birthdays, etc. And it has no minimum money requirement to keep it open, which we really needed in this specific case.
Any reason you don't use them as your primary bank? I set it up with direct deposit, and I never deposit cash so for me it works out great. On the rare account I get a paper check, I just use the mobile deposit feature. It's very comparable to Ally
The Starwood AmEx just now started offering no foreign transaction fees as well as free Boingo wifi at airports. If anyone wants a referral, PM me.
Only because I have all of my money in a credit union right now, and haven't really looked into changing it. Also, I was about to apply for the American Express Blue Cash referred card, and if someone wanted to refer me to try to get a bonus or anything, let me know, and I'd be glad to help out.
If by "referred card" you mean "preferred card" then I will refer you! Looks like I'll just need your first name and email.
The one with the best conversion rates that you can use... If you use amazon and its card is 10,000=$100 do it. If you fly and your miles/points is higher than that, do it. The thing to consider are no annual fee cards that generate points and more importantly credit worthiness. You use those as pillars for your credit score in order to churn sexier cards. For example, I have one card for 12 years (cap one platinum). CapOne, the company, might be dirtbags, but pay on time and without interest and it's just another card in the system. Once I apply for a better card (cancel after the free annual fee), then my avg is divided among total age of cards (13/2=6.5). Simplistically, this allows me to qualify for higher bonus yielding cards, like a black travel card that comes with 85k hotel points, $300 travel voucher (per calendar year = 600) all for a $400 annual fee. Since I travel a lot, it works for me because it's pretty much cash. For you, the United Mileageplus card (was 80k pts for me...currently they're too stingy at 30k) is a great start because if you don't fly often, when you do your status is bumped up to Silver and you don't have to worry about transaction fees for other currencies. Tip of the iceberg stuff. Just be smart about it and cancel on time. Don't worry about credit score impact provided you have several cards that can stay alive for years without impacting your wallet in annual fees that harm you more than help you. Flyertalk or pointsguy has more good info.
Need some quick help please: I have large purchase coming up and can pay using Chase Freedom for 1% cash back. However I will be traveling a lot in the next 2 years so would like to open a miles credit card. I'm thinking about the Southwest card or United Explorer card. Bonuses: Southwest: 25k miles after $1000 spent United: 30k miles after $1000 spent Regular: Both: 1 mile/$ on any purchase or 2 miles/$ for purchases with the same company Annual Fees: Both $95, but United waives the 1st year I have an international flight coming up in 2015 and another in 2016. I fly back and forth to CHI about once in 2 months but my flights are purchased through November. Typical CHI costs are below: Typical cost on Southwest: $180 Typical cost on United: $250 Same flight cost by miles on Southwest: ~12,000 Same flight cost by miles on United: ~19,000 Miles earned per journey on Southwest: ~700 Miles earned per journey on United: unknown Which one do I choose? I think the academic answer here, disregarding credit ratings, is to open both and get the bonus from both cards. But I could be totally wrong United card gives me a chance to apply miles to international travel
Ally Bank is also fee free, no ATM fees, reimburses ATM fees from the ATM (certain number per month) and their checking has a .6 APY vs .06 for Schwab.
How set are you on those two airlines and how big is your big purchase? Generally, you can get much better bonuses than 30k. Chase Sapphire Preferred will give you a 40k bonus that can be transferred directly to United, Southwest, and a few other airlines. But it requires $3k spend in 3 months. American has a 75k bonus going on, but for $7500 spend, or a 50k bonus for $3k in spend. If you can come up with a reason to get a business card ("I sell things on ebay!"), United has a 50k business card with $2k minimum spend. Supposedly, United has a 50k regular offer ($2k spend), but it's harder to find. Generally, you can find some of the best offers here: http://www.freefrequentflyermiles.com/index.htm From there, click "Credit Cards" on the left side, and then "Annual Fee" cards on the top. (There's no direct link, unfortunately.) From there, they have links to the "secret" higher offers that are available - including all the ones I listed above.
Which card do you have already? I'd pay with that one. If you were interested in a miles card, wait until the card is running its bigger promotion. I know Southwest does 50k miles for new accounts, but the current promotion is only 25k. You're better off waiting until Southwest does its 50k. I don't know United's promotion, but if they have a history of giving a better deal, wait for that.
On a side note, if you do get United or AA miles, their best value is generally on international flights. You ideally want to get close to $0.017-$0.02 per mile - so if you have 50k miles, you'd like it to be worth about $1000 worth of tickets. Domestic tends to get less value than that, while international - at the right times with the discounted international saver mileage rates - tend to be worth more. There are exceptions of course, but that's a good rule of thumb.
I'm set with those only because they are my more frequently used airlines, though neither are used for my international travel. I usually go with KLM/Emirates. My purchase is really large, about $8000 for which I luckily have the credit limit on my Chase Freedom card. I thought about the Sapphire card but wasn't sure about how points transfer to miles to the different airlines. Would I be able to apply those points to any of Southwest/United/KLM/Emirates? The wording on the offer says yes I believe. Actually it seems the Sapphire gives me the best return for now. Thanks for the link - I'll look through some of the higher bonus offers there and let you know which I decide. I have the Freedom which means I'd get about $80 cash back instantly from my purchase. My problem is that I don't really have a long time to wait for the bonuses for now - I'll look through the current offers and just pick the best one I guess. I think as long as I can get one free flight without the first year's annual fee, I'll be coming out ahead than buying with Chase Freedom. Thanks for the help guys
So my strategy should be to save up my miles to buy the international flight when it comes up - makes sense. Thanks again Major
It doesn't look like they are partnered with KLM or Emirates, but for United and Southwest, you can transfer points 1:1 as long as they are in 1000 pt increments. So if you need 7000 United miles, you can just transfer that many straight into your United frequent flyer accountSo the miles are actual miles as opposed the "miles" like Capital One or whatnot. It's a super-easy process. You fill out a short online form and then the miles move within about an hour or so. They also work with some other partners like Virgin Atlantic and Singapore Air. The big benefit of Sapphire is the flexibility that you're not locked into one airline from the start. You can also use them for various hotel programs, but generally the value is much lower. I don't know anything about KLM or Emirates Air, but KLM seems partnered with Delta, so it's possible that if you got a 50k Delta card, you could somehow use those miles for a KLM flight, but it might require more research. Emirates Air seems to be partnered with AMEX Points, but again, not sure how that works exactly.
